A Spindle, A Portkey and a Unicorn
by kenziescott54
Summary: Molly Weasley has a very strange afternoon. Written for a Sleeping-Beauty themed fairytales assignment in the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry forum. Sort of crack-ish.


**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Harry Potter (or any fairytales, either).**

* * *

It was a lazy day. Mother and Father were busy, and Molly and Lucy were left to devise whatever games a pair of seven year olds could think of on a dull, unseasonably hot day.

There was no question about their playing any strenuous games, not in this heat. Molly and Lucy were in the storage shed, playing a game of marbles. Molly was feeling sleepier and sleepier; Lucy swam in a multicolored blur in front of her.

"Let's play something else," said Lucy, "I'm tired of marbles."

"Play what?" muttered Molly, feeling hot and stupid.

"I dunno," said Lucy, standing up. "There's got to be something in all these old boxes. Let's look -"

"Oh, Lucy, let's not," Molly said. "I'm sure Mother won't like it if we go poking around in all these things. Besides, I don't want to."

But Lucy was already picking through the closest box. "Look, Molly," she said. "A key. I wonder what this goes to."

"Who cares," said Molly.

"Oh, and look," Lucy added. "A little bag of beans! How odd - they must have been in this box for ages, but they're still alive!"

Molly was hardly listening.

"How pretty!" Lucy cried. "A little shoe - and it's all made out of glass, Molly! Look!"

"Lovely," said Molly.

"And here's a spindle," said Lucy, picking it up out of the box.

"Lucy, I really don't care," Molly told her. "Please stop pulling things out. Mother won't like it!"

"You're no fun," Lucy grumbled. "And I didn't pull anything out - I mean, I did put it all back -"

"You haven't put back the spindle," said Molly. "Put that back and let's go inside."

"I don't _wanna_ go inside!" Lucy protested, poking out her lower lip. "I wanna stay out here and play!"

Molly sighed. She was always being told that she had to watch out for her sister, not because she was younger but because Lucy was the one that always tended to get herself into trouble.

"Put it back," she said, trying to sound authoritative, like Mother. "We're going inside."

"No," said Lucy.

Well, that hadn't worked. Molly scrambled to her feet and tried to pull the spindle out of Lucy's hands.

"Stop!" Lucy cried, tightening her grip on the spindle. "What are you doing?"

"Put it down," said Molly, tugging harder. "You don't need a spindle, Lucy!"

"Yes I do!"

"No you don't!"

"Yes I DO!"

"Let go, Lucy," Molly insisted. "This is stupid."

"I don't want to let go!"

At that moment, Molly felt a warning pull in her stomach.

"Oh, Lucy, let go!" she screamed. "Put it down! Oh -"

"No!" Lucy screamed back.

"I'm serious!" Molly cried, but she already knew it was too late. She and Lucy were already starting to spin, and seconds later, they staggered apart in an entirely different place.

"Wh-where are we?" Lucy stammered. "Was that a Portkey?"

"I guess," said Molly, looking around. They were in an enormous, completely vacant room with high windows and four large, long tables and one medium sized table at the front.

"I...I think we're at Hogwarts," Molly said. "I remember Mummy telling me about this room - it's called the Great Hall…"

"Hogwarts?" said Lucy. "Why would we be at Hogwarts?" She picked up the spindle again. "Ow!"

"What do you mean, ow?" asked Molly, in some alarm. "Lucy?"

"I feel odd," said Lucy, her voice slurred.

"Lucy!"

But Lucy dropped to the floor, her eyes shut tightly.

"Lucy!" Molly screamed. "No, Lucy! Wake up!" She shook her sister by the shoulders. "Wake up, _please!_ "

But Lucy's eyes remained closed. Molly held her hand over Lucy's mouth and to her relief, she felt her sister's breath warm on her hand. Lucy was alive, but unconscious.

Molly laid her sister gently down on the floor again and began to think hard. She was at Hogwarts, and it was mid-morning; it was also early May, which meant that school was in and there were presumably students and teachers somewhere. If she left the Hall to find one of them, then they would know what to do about Lucy.

"Sorry, Lucy," Molly whispered. "I'm not leaving you, I promise I'll come back, okay?"

But Lucy, being unconscious, did not answer.

Molly left the Hall in a hurry. Hogwarts, on any day that you visit, is a grand and impressive sight; but Molly didn't have time to stop and look around. She was on a mission.

After hunting around for a long time, Molly began to feel rather frightened. She had seen a lot of rooms, many of which were obviously classrooms, because of the desks. But she had not yet encountered a single person. She had also seen the courtyard - completely empty. By the end of an hour, the only living things Molly had seen were a spider and a lovely, shiny apple.

It seemed as if the castle was entirely vacant.

She'd found the apple sitting on one of the desks, so she picked it up and carried it with her. She was very hungry by now, but she couldn't think of eating until she found someone to wake Lucy up so they could share it. But there didn't seem to be anyone in the castle at all; she felt lonely, and began to cry as she wandered around in the great, empty halls.

She went back to the great hall and sat down next to Lucy, who was still completely unconscious. "If only…" she murmured to herself.

If only Lucy _hadn't_ picked up the spindle.

* * *

"Why are you crying, little girl?" asked the unicorn.

Molly looked up. She had never seen a unicorn before, but she knew what they looked like because she had seen pictures of them. She thought this one was very much the loveliest thing she had ever seen in her life.

"Please," she said, "my sister won't wake up, and I can't find anyone to help me. Will you?"

"Alas," said the unicorn, "I cannot."

Molly began to cry very bitterly indeed.

"But," said the unicorn, "I shall tell you how you can."

"Oh, please do!" cried Molly.

"Look there," said the unicorn. "Do you see that splinter in her finger?"

Molly looked at Lucy's hand, and there indeed was a tiny wooden splinter, halfway embedded in her little sister's finger.

"Oh!" she cried. "I didn't see that before!"

"Well, take it out," said the unicorn. "She will wake up when you do. And when she wakes up, give her a bite of the apple. It will remove the magic that the splinter is causing to keep her asleep."

"Thank you, unicorn!" cried Molly. She pulled the splinter out of Lucy's finger with great care, and to her relief her little sister's eyes popped open at once.

"Why, Molly," she said sleepily, "have you been crying?"

"You have to eat a bite of this," said Molly at once, picking up the apple. "Please!"

Obediently, Lucy bit into the apple. "It tastes lovely," she said.

"I should probably have mentioned," remarked the unicorn, "that the apple would make your sister lose her memory."

"What?" shrieked Molly.

The unicorn sighed. "But, as it was the only thing that would remove the poison, I'm afraid I can't apologize for that."

Molly looked at her sister; Lucy looked almost the same, but her eyes looked vacant and stupid.

"Oh, dear!" she cried. "This day gets worse and worse! If only Lucy hadn't picked up the spindle! What do I do now?"

"I'm sure I don't know," remarked the unicorn.

"But how can you not know?"

The unicorn stared at her. "I'm sure I don't understand your question," it said loftily. "How can I tell you why I don't know what I don't know? Why don't you know what you don't know? We can't be expected to know why we don't know what we want to know, even if we know why we do know what it's useless to us to know."

"What?" asked Molly, utterly confused.

"I _don't know_ ," said the unicorn.

"I know," said Molly, who was going to say that she knew that the unicorn didn't know, but she hadn't understood what the unicorn had just said.

"Oh, you do? Well, I don't."

"I don't understand," began Molly, frowning.

"I thought you did."

"Why?"

"You said so."

"When did I say that?"

"Just now."

"No I didn't."

"Yes, you did."

"No I didn't."

"I will not descend to arguing like a pair of idiots," said the unicorn, with great dignity. "If this is how I am to be treated, then I think I will leave you alone."

"No, please don't!" said Molly hastily. "I wasn't trying to get you to leave. I just meant, I thought you would know how to get Lucy's memory back."

"Oh, that!" said the unicorn. "Well, I wouldn't know how. This is your dream, after all. I expect if you woke up, she would have it back."

"What?" asked Molly. "Do you mean to say I'm asleep?"

"Well, of course," said the unicorn. "Didn't you know that? When else would a unicorn appear inside Hogwarts?"

"How on earth am I supposed to know when I'm asleep?" asked Molly, affronted.

"You can't," said the unicorn. "But anyone ought to know when they're dreaming. Now, wake up!"

"How?"

"Well, you could start by opening your eyes." The unicorn's voice sounded different as it said this.

"They are open!"

"No they aren't, darling," said the unicorn, its voice even more different.

"They are now!" said Molly, forcing her eyes completely open. Her mother was looking down at her.

"Silly girl," she said affectionately. "Of course your eyes are closed when you're asleep."

"I know," said Molly, "but you see, I didn't know I was asleep. Where's Lucy?"

"Right here," said Mummy, nodding to the fast sleeping bundle next to Molly. "Come along, let's go have dinner."

Molly shook Lucy's shoulder.

"Lucy, wake up!" she said insistently. Lucy blinked her eyes open.

"What?" she said sleepily.

"Have you got your memory back?" asked Molly.

"What d'ye mean?" grumbled Lucy. "What's wrong with my memory? Mummy, I'm hot. Can we go inside now?"

"Yes, darling," said Mummy. "I expect you had a dream, Molly dear. Come along, let's not keep Daddy waiting."

* * *

 **Assignment:** So, your task this week? Your task this week is to write about twins (or triplets, etc)! Easy enough, right? Here's the catch: You may not write about Fred and George. Fred and George are the main set of twins in the story of Harry Potter, and you know me, I'm all about writing about the underdogs. You can make canon characters that are not twins, twins however.

 **Extra Prompts:** Please use at least two. **BONUS twenty points** if you use them all.

(Characters) Molly and Lucy Weasley

(Creature) Unicorn

(Item) Spindle

(Food) Apple

(Word) vacant

(Word) Memory

(Location) Hogwarts

(Word) Storage

(Dialogue) "If only..."

(Thing) Splinter

 **Words total (not counting ANs): 1720**


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